Video of DREAM THEATER singer James LaBrie belting out an a cappella version of the band’s song “The Spirit Carries On” can be seen below.

LaBrie sang a couple of lines from the track while filming a new video message on Cameo, which lets users hire celebrities to record brief, personalized video messages about virtually any topic.

Cameo reportedly features more than 20,000 celebrities — from musicians and actors to drag queens and from YouTubers to Olympic gold medallists — who, for fees from $1 to $2,500, will offer video messages that mention another person by name. Happy birthday messages are common, as are baby announcements, but some celebrities have also recorded messages for Cameo users looking to quit their jobs or ask a potential date to a prom. The price for a video is determined by the celebrity.

LaBrie charges $75 for each of his Cameo videos for personal use $300 for a video for business use.

LaBrie’s new solo album “Beautiful Shade Of Gray”, is due on May 20 via InsideOut Music. Unlike previous LPs “Elements Of Persuasion” (2005), “Static Impulse” (2010) and “Impermanent Resonance” (2013), which were written and recorded as a collaboration with LaBrie’s songwriting partner for over a dozen years, Matt Guillory, the new effort was tracked with Scottish musician Paul Logue, bassist and founding member of the multinational melodic metal band EDEN’S CURSE.

DREAM THEATER’s latest LP, “A View From The Top Of The World”, was released in October. It was produced by guitarist John Petrucci, with engineering and additional production by James “Jimmy T” Meslin and mixing and mastering by Andy Sneap. The artwork for “A View From The Top Of The World” was created by longtime DREAM THEATER collaborator Hugh Syme (RUSH, IRON MAIDEN, STONE SOUR).

DREAM THEATER — comprised of Petrucci, LaBrie, Jordan Rudess, John Myung and Mike Mangini — was in the middle of a sold-out world tour in support of its 2019 last release “Distance Over Time” and the 20th anniversary of “Scenes From A Memory” when a global pandemic brought the world to a stop. The musicians found themselves at home, with LaBrie in Canada and the rest of the group in the States. As fate would have it, they’d just finished construction on DTHQ (Dream Theater Headquarters) — a combination live recording studio, rehearsal space, control room, equipment storage, and creative hive. With LaBrie in Canada, he initially wrote with the band via Zoom on a monitor in DTHQ. In March 2021, he flew down to New York, quarantined, and recorded his vocals face to face with Petrucci.

Legendary rockers CHEAP TRICK have announced a residency at the 900-seat The Strat Theater in Las Vegas, Nevada, set to take place February 25-26 and March 4-5.

According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, tickets — which start at $75 and run as high as $300 for VIP packages — will go on sale at 10 a.m. Monday, January 3 at tickets.thestrat.com/CheapTrick. All attendees will be required to receive a negative COVID-19 test within 72-hours prior to event entry, or have vaccination cards showing they are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

The VIP Soundcheck Experience includes:

* A unique opportunity to attend the band’s private pre-show soundcheck
* Exclusive CHEAP TRICK merchandise
* Commemorative VIP laminate
* Dedicated entrance and check-in with a member of CHEAP TRICK’s team
* Early entry to venue
* Group picture with the band

“We’re going to play sort of like what we had done before, when we’ve played a full album, and then extra tracks,” CHEAP TRICK guitarist Rick Nielsen told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. “We’re going to try to do that in Vegas. We can play the first album, the second album, third album and fourth album over a four-night stand.”

CHEAP TRICK’s 20th studio album, “In Another World”, was released in April 2021 via BMG. Produced by longtime associate Julian Raymond, the LP saw CHEAP TRICK doing what they do better than anyone — crafting indelible rock ‘n’ roll with oversized hooks, mischievous lyrics, and seemingly inexorable energy. Trademark anthems like “Light Up The Fire” and “Boys & Girls & Rock N Roll” are countered by more introspective — but no less exuberant — considerations of times past, present, and unknowable future on such strikingly potent new tracks as “Another World” and “I’ll See You Again”.

“In Another World” — which marks CHEAP TRICK’s first new LP since 2017’s double-header of “We’re All Alright!” and “Christmas Christmas” — further showcases CHEAP TRICK at their most eclectic, touching on a myriad of distinct sounds and song approaches, from the swampy Chicago blues number “Final Days” (featuring fiery harmonica from Grammy Award-nominated singer and WET WILLIE frontman Jimmy Hall) to a timely rendition of John Lennon’s still-relevant “Gimme Some Truth”, originally released for Record Store Day Black Friday 2019 and featuring the instantly recognizable guitar sound of erstwhile SEX PISTOLS guitarist Steve Jones.

CHEAP TRICK is, of course, one of rock’s hardest-working live acts, lighting it up at arenas, concert halls, and amphitheaters worldwide more than 150 nights each year. Alas, recent events have forced the band off the road for perhaps the longest hiatus of their storied history.

Peter Criss has shared two new videos to celebrate the arrival of 2022.

The original KISS drummer, who turned 76 on December 20, has posted clips of him playing a “rock drum solo” and a “Spanish drum solo” at what appears to be a room in his house. Check out the footage below.

Criss first left KISS in 1980. Since then he’s worked with other bands and released solo albums. He teamed up with KISS again for a reunion tour in the 1990s and most recently in 2004. He was replaced by Eric Singer.

In addition to playing drums in KISS, Peter also provided lead vocals for a number the band’s most popular and memorable songs, including “Beth”, “Black Diamond” and “Hard Luck Woman”.

Criss, who was known as “Catman,” released his last solo CD, titled “One For All”, in 2007. Peter produced the album himself for the first time, and was joined by guest musicians that included keyboardist Paul Shaffer and bassist Will Lee of “Late Night With David Letterman”. The album featured a range of styles, from rock and jazz to blues and Broadway, and included covers of “What A Difference A Day Makes” and “Send In The Clowns”.

Criss played what was being billed as his final U.S. concert in June 2017 at the Cutting Room in New York City.

Tony Martin, who fronted BLACK SABBATH from 1987 to 1991 and then again from 1993 to 1997, confirmed to Almost Human in a new interview that he recorded some demos for the band’s “Dehumanizer” album during a period when Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler were having a hard time getting along with a returning Ronnie James Dio. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “They fired me [prior to the start of the ‘Dehumanizer’ sessions], which, by the way, was a complete surprise. I didn’t see that coming at all. In fact, I was walking out of the door to go to rehearsals for the next album, and the phone rang just as I was leaving the door. And my manager [was on the other end of the line], and he said, ‘You’d better sit down, kid.’ I [was, like], ‘Go on. What?’ And he said, ‘They don’t want your services anymore.’ [I said], ‘What? You’re kidding me.’ I just didn’t see that coming at all. So, wow, okay. I was just so shocked by that, I didn’t know what to say, do or anything.’ But within weeks I was back — it was four, five, six weeks maybe, something like that. I got a call from Tony Iommi saying, ‘This isn’t going very well [with] Dio.’ I said, ‘Oh, really?’ And he said, ‘No. Can you come back?’ And I said, ‘No. I can’t come back. I’ve already started doing my solo stuff and I’ve moved on.’ [And he said], ‘Okay. Okay.’ So then a few months went by, and he called me again. And he said, ‘Are you sure you can’t come back? It’s really not working.’ So they invited me to go to the studio when they were recording the stuff, so I went down there. And I did try to get some melodies and stuff, but they were short of time, as usual. And I said, ‘Look, if I’m gonna do this, I need to rewrite this whole thing. I need to take it away and sit with it and work it out.’ They said, ‘We don’t have the time for that.’ [So I said], ‘I’m gonna have to leave it with you. Probably the best thing to do is just continue with Dio, and then we’ll talk afterwards.’ So even through the Dio period, there was connections, and I was still talking to Tony. In fact, I went to the show [they played] in my hometown with Dio. Actually, Dio wasn’t pleased at all to see me there. ‘Cause, obviously, Tony Iommi had invited me. And, of course, Dio comes offstage and I’m still backstage. He was not impressed with that at all. So there was a connection going through the ‘Dehumanizer’ thing pretty much most of the way through — not in a constant way, but on and off.”

Asked if he did any studio recordings for “Dehumanizer”, Martin said: “Yeah, I did try. I just couldn’t get anything that was gonna sound better than what they’d done [with Dio]. And I have to make it sound like Tony Martin. There’s no point in asking me to do it if you don’t want me to sound like me. So at that point I was kind of thinking, ‘I don’t really wanna just keep copying people’s stuff.’ I did try and I did put some demos down. But I doubt very much — in fact, I’m 99 percent certain there’s nothing left of [those recordings]. I’ve got a couple of brief cassette copies of something I tried, but it’s really horrible quality — just a cassette thing. It just reminds me of the day. Yeah, I did give it a go. But I don’t think I could better, really, what they’d done. So we sort of moved on, really.”

BLACK SABBATH released six albums with Martin on vocals: “The Eternal Idol” (1987), “Headless Cross” (1989), “Tyr” (1990), “Cross Purposes” (1994), “Cross Purposes Live” (1995) and “Forbidden” (1995). Eventually, Martin and his “Forbidden”-era bandmates were ousted when guitarist Tony Iommi reunited with SABBATH’s fellow original members.

In a 1992 interview with Guitar World magazine, Iommi stated about the “Dehumanizer” period: “Getting back together with Ronnie James Dio was a little rough in the beginning — there were all kinds of egos bouncing around. We had been separated for 10 years, and it took us a long time to get to know each other again.

“Tony Martin had been our singer for the last three albums, and I must admit, I did feel bad that we had to let him go. But the truth is he wanted to get out. He was getting more into writing for other people instead of performing SABBATH material. He understood the situation with Ronnie, so it really wasn’t a problem.

“Before we [Iommi, Dio, Butler and drummer Vinny Appice] started writing ‘Dehumanizer’, we talked about what we wanted. We decided to make a very heavy BLACK SABBATH record that had a real natural sound and a ton of doomy riffs — nothing too jolly.

“The material is sort of a cross between the old stuff and ‘Heaven And Hell’. It has a raunchy sound — something I think had been missing from SABBATH over the last few years. This is very much a classic BLACK SABBATH record. In fact, I didn’t expect it to come out quite this good.”

In a 2012 interview with Über Röck, Martin said that he was “surprised” to see Iommi criticizing him in the guitarist’s “Iron Man: My Journey Through Heaven And Hell With Black Sabbath” book (referring to the Martin period, especially the touring phase following the release of “Cross Purposes” in 1994, Iommi lambasted his former singer as “unprofessional” and having “no stage presence”). Martin said: “I mean, they never said anything to me. Surely, if you’ve got a problem, the first person you should say something to is the person that’s in the band with you… It sounds like a really stupid thing to say, as they didn’t say anything to my face — and, if that’s the case, then more fool them for not saying anything, because, you know, we could have fixed it. I said to them, endlessly, that if there was anything they wanted changed, done differently, just to say and we could fix it, but clearly, they didn’t, they hadn’t got the guts to, obviously, and to write about it in a book afterwards seems a bit daft to me. I’m not bitter about it, but it is surprising… It seems a bit stupid to say that after the event.”

Six years ago, Iommi told I Heart Guitar that “it’s a shame” that “it took a lot for people to accept” Martin as SABBATH’s vocalist. “It’s taken all these years later for people to say, ‘Oh blimey, that was a good band with good singing.’ So it took a long time to get people to really realize how good it was.”

In 2018, Iommi spent time in the studio remixing “Forbidden” for a future release. The LP, which features Martin, drummer Cozy Powell and bassist Neil Murray, is often regarded as SABBATH’s worst studio recording.

Martin’s new solo album, “Thorns”, will arrive on January 14 via Battlegod Productions and Dark Star Records. Among the guest musicians appearing on the LP are Scott McClellan (who helped write the album), Danny “Danté” Needham (VENOM), Magnus Rosén (HAMMERFALL), Greg Smith (ALICE COOPER, RAINBOW, BLUE ÖYSTER CULT) and Martin’s youngest son Joe.

KISS bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons was asked in a recent interview with the Toronto Sun about his New Year’s resolutions and hopes for 2022. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “I’d like to a better, kinder, better-looking and richer guy. Not all of that’s gonna happen, but I can certainly become a better person — be kinder, give more to philanthropy, reach out even to people who you disagree with completely. We all live on this planet, and you’re not gonna be able to change everybody’s mind. And that’s okay. Agree to disagree. ‘Hey, I don’t agree with you. Let’s go have some coffee.'”

Last year, Simmons told Art & Object that he hoped KISS would play another 200 shows before finally calling it quits.

“If I was in U2 or THE [ROLLING] STONES, both amazing classic bands, I could be Keith [Richards] or the Edge, wear a pair of comfortable sneakers and a t-shirt, and you’re done, no fuss, no muss, easypeasy, no sweat,” he said. “But no, I have to wear eight-inch platform heels. Each of the dragon boots weighs as much as a bowling ball. So you’re walking around with two bowling balls on your feet, 40 pounds of armor studs, guitar, and all that stuff. Then I got to spit fire, fly through the air, it’s exhausting. THE STONES, god bless ’em, can keep doing this into their eighties.”

KISS launched its farewell trek in January 2019 but was forced to put it on hold in 2020 and part of 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“End Of The Road” was originally scheduled to conclude on July 17, 2021 in New York City but has since been extended to at least the end of 2022. The trek was announced in September 2018 following a KISS performance of the band’s classic song “Detroit Rock City” on “America’s Got Talent”.

Last fall, KISS frontman Paul Stanley said that the final concert of the “End Of The Road” tour will likely happen within the next year and a half.

In a recent interview with Chicago’s WXAV 88.3 FM radio station, EXODUS singer Steve “Zetro” Souza was asked how the introduction of social media has affected the music industry. He responded (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “It made it more accessible for people to get to their favorite bands, definitely. There’s a plus and minus to it. But then again, it took the mystique away from it, I think. But that’s with everything. Before, you were at a concert and you saw, like — I don’t know — Angus [Young, AC/DC guitarist] walking off of a bus or one of the guys in AEROSMITH and he looked over and waved at you, you’d be so pleased because it’s such a rare thing. Now they’ll film themselves and put it on their own Instagram of them doing shit like that. There’s no validity to it anymore. It’s not special. It’s not, like, ‘Wow. How cool was that? I got to check this out. And this is so cool. And, man, this is an exclusive picture,’ or whatever. Now there’s a camera on everybody’s telephone… So what’s the memory to get with anyone? It’s a photo or a video. So there you go. And it puts it in your hands. So the mystique is gone… [Fans attending concerts will] take a picture of themselves with the band behind them, like, ‘Look where I’m at. I’m at this gig.’ It’s, like, ‘Oh my God. Watch the show. Put the phone down.’ But we don’t get a lot of that, because when we go to play, there’s a moshpit, there’s people going crazy. And there’s a good chance [the phone will] get knocked out of your hand. I mena, it happens. In our genre of metal, there’s not 40 people in the front holding the camera because they won’t be able to. It kind of works in our favor.”

EXODUS’s latest album, “Persona Non Grata”, came out in November via Nuclear Blast Records. It is the follow-up to 2014’s “Blood In Blood Out”, which was the San Francisco Bay Area thrashers’ first release since the departure of Rob Dukes and the return of Souza, who previously fronted EXODUS from 1986 to 1993 and from 2002 to 2004.

“Persona Non Grata” was recorded at a studio in Lake Almanor, California and was engineered by Steve Lagudi and EXODUS. It was produced by EXODUS and was mixed by Andy Sneap. For the third time in the band’s history, they returned to Swedish artist Pär Olofsson to create the album artwork.

In July 2021, EXODUS drummer Tom Hunting underwent a successful total gastrectomy in his battle with squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the stomach. He rejoined his bandmates on stage on October 7, 2021 at the Aftershock festival in Sacramento, California.

Ykä Järvinen, who directed, edited and produced BODOM AFTER MIDNIGHT’s music video for the title track of the band’s “Paint The Sky With Blood” EP, has shared previously unreleased studio footage from the EP recording sessions, which took place in November 2020. You can check out the two short clips below.

BODOM AFTER MIDNIGHT was formed in 2020 by former CHILDREN OF BODOM frontman Alexi Laiho. He was joined in the group by guitarist Daniel Freyberg, drummer Waltteri Väyrynen (PARADISE LOST), bassist Mitja Toivonen (ex-SANTA CRUZ) and live keyboardist Vili Itäpelto.

Alexi died on December 29, 2020 in his home in Helsinki, Finland. He died of alcohol-induced degeneration of the liver and pancreas connective tissue. Furthermore, Laiho had a cocktail of painkillers, opioids and insomnia medication in his system. He had suffered from long-term health issues leading up to his death.

In a message accompanying the YouTube release of the second BODOM AFTER MIDNIGHT studio video, Järvinen wrote: “I have quite a lot footage from these BODOM AFTER MIDNIGHT studio sessions which never got released because maestro left this realm way too soon. I really don’t know if any more of this stuff will be released, but here’s another small clip I did edit over a year ago as a demo for the guys. I hope you enjoy it.”

Laiho’s ashes were buried last month — nearly a year after his tragic passing at the age of 41. He was laid to rest at the Malmi Cemetery, a large cemetery located in the Malmi district in Helsinki, Finland.

Australian-born music publicist Kelli Wright, who says she married the musician three years before his death, announced Alexi’s burial in a social media post on December 10, 2021. She wrote: “Finally, with extremely mixed emotions, I can announce MY late, unconditionally and forever loved husband’s ashes were buried yesterday on our 4 th Wedding Anniversary. The family Laiho plot is where he was buried. Alexi and Kelli 2005 – eternity”.

A large gravestone has been ordered for Alexi’s final resting place, but it has not yet been installed. Social media posts of Alexi’s grave show a candle sitting on top of his burial spot.

At the time of his death, Alexi was still legally married to his former SINERGY bandmate Kimberly Goss. In January 2021, Finnish tabloid Ilta-Sanomat reported that Laiho tied the knot with Goss in February 2002, and the couple never officially divorced. Although Laiho filed for divorce in November 2002, he quickly withdrew the petition and never filed another.

According to Finnish law, Laiho and Wright would not have been able to legally wed, as Laiho and Goss had never terminated their marriage.

In March 2021, Alexi’s sister Anna accused Kimberly of holding up the burial process, writing in a social media post that Goss was using “her legal rights as a widow, preventing grie[v]ing mother and father [from] bury[ing] their own son. Her selfish and narcissistic explanation is that she wanted to take part in the funeral and still wants to be present when the ashes are buried,” she wrote. “But our family does not want this monster anywhere near us.”

For her part, Goss, who lives in Chicago, Illinois, denied allegations that was “a ‘gold-digger’ who Alexi ‘hated’,” explaining that “this can be easily disproven through the beautiful text and video messages he sent me daily, right until the last day of his life. Messages so sweet, yet so heartbreaking at the same time. Heartbreaking because you can see how ill he was. I tried everything I could to help him. I often messaged people in Helsinki to check in on him because I was so worried.”

Last month, Anna told Ilta-Sanomat that “the protracted dispute” over her brother’s ashes was “over” and that she and the rest of her family welcomed the opportunity to focus on grieving her brother “in a new way.”

Alexi and drummer Jaska Raatikainen founded CHILDREN OF BODOM in 1993, and the band was one of the most internationally acclaimed metal acts in Finland up until their very last farewell concert in December of 2019.

BODOM AFTER MIDNIGHT recorded three songs and shot one music video, all of which were released posthumously.

Besides CHILDREN OF BODOM, Laiho had played in such acts as WARMEN, SINERGY, KYLÄHULLUT and THE LOCAL BAND. Awarded with a Metal Hammer Golden God and several other international prizes, the guitarist was also the main star, leading a group of one hundred guitar players at the Helsinki Festival in 2015 in “100 Guitars From Hel” — a massive concert piece he composed.

Ted Nugent has blasted Rolling Stone magazine for including Joan Jett on its list of “100 Greatest Guitarists”.

The 73-year-old rocker, whose recent time in the spotlight has been more for his political views than his music, railed against Jett’s inclusion on the list while praising such great musicians as Angus Young (AC/DC), Eddie Van Halen (VAN HALEN), Billy Gibbons (ZZ TOP), Neal Schon (JOURNEY), Joe Bonamassa, Derek St. Holmes, Tommy Shaw (STYX) and Rickey Medlocke (LYNYRD SKYNYRD) during his December 30 YouTube livestream.

He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “So I just mentioned some killer, monster guitar players, huh? Some of the best that ever lived. But when you see the Rolling Stone magazine list of greatest guitar players, they list Joan Jett but not Tommy Shaw.

“How do you list the top 100 guitar players and not list Derek St. Holmes?” he continued. “How do you do that? You do that by lying. The same way you get Grandmaster Flash in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. You do that by lying. You have to be a liar. You have to have shit for brains and you have to be a soulless, soulless prick to put Joan Jett… [I] love Joan. Some of my greatest memories include lesbians. I love the lesbians; it’s a cocktail of wonderment. [I] love Joan Jett — ‘put another diamond in the jukebox, baby’; great rock and roller — but as a top 100 guitar player, but you don’t list Rickey Medlocke or Dave Amato [REO SPEEDWAGON]. Really? Or Dick Wagner? Dick Wagner and THE FROST from Detroit. Or Mark Farner? Mark Farner from GRAND FUNK RAILROAD. Joan Jett is on the list but not Mark Farner? Grandmaster Flash is in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame but not GRAND FUNK RAILROAD? [Laughs]

“By the way, if Grandmaster Flash is in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame and Joan Jett is on the list of top 100 guitar players, then I’m Caitlyn Jenner’s boy toy.”

This is not the first time Nugent has been critical of Rolling Stone editor David Fricke’s choices for “100 Greatest Guitarists”. Three years ago, he said that he hasn’t gotten the recognition that he deserves as a guitar player, explaining: “This isn’t ego. I have an ego, because I have self-esteem, because I put my heart and soul into being the best that I can be. If you run a race and your chest breaks the ribbon and you’ve won the race, I think you can look in the camera and go, ‘Man, I’m fast. Man, I ran good.’ I think that should be celebrated. Excellence should always be celebrated. But remember, those people in the musical [sic] industry who make those decisions about who’s best and who is in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, they hate me because I’m against dope. And I am against dope. I don’t think it’s good. I don’t want my sons and daughters, I don’t want my grandkids, I don’t want my pilots, I don’t want my band, I don’t want my crew stoned. I don’t want them comfortably numb. I don’t wanna have to wake ’em up three times to get to the gig. I don’t wanna have to remind ’em how the song goes. I’ve had this all my life. And these people in charge of deciding this, they don’t like me because I’m on the board of directors with the highest votes for 25 years on the National Rifle Association. They somehow blame inanimate tools on crime.”

He continued: “I know that Jimi Hendrix was a god, and Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley and Joe Perry and Joe Bonamassa and Rickey Medlocke and Billy Gibbons and Eddie Van Halen and Stevie Ray Vaughan. Of course they’re the best. Steve Vai. Joe Satriani. Hell, Vic [Johnson] in Sammy Hagar’s band is an unbelievable guitar player. Derek St. Holmes is an unbelievable guitar player. Brad Whitford… I could go on and on and on — unlimited. But to think that I don’t qualify in the top one hundred of guitar players in America is just a stupid lie. Case closed.”

Nugent’s new studio album, “Detroit Muscle”, is due on April 29 via Pavement Music. The follow-up to 2018’s “The Music Made Me Do It” was recorded with Ted’s current band, which includes bassist Greg Smith and drummer Jason Hartless.

In a new interview with “I Ask No One With Kevin Re LoVullo”, former JUDAS PRIEST guitarist K.K. Downing spoke about the fact that he has been sidelined from concert halls during the coronavirus pandemic, unable to properly promote the recently released debut album from his new band KK’S PRIEST. “It’s just annoying. It’s very annoying,” he said. “I actually got my booster jab yesterday. I didn’t want to. I don’t think anybody wants to. It’s just the fact that my dear mom, she’s 88, and you just live in fear that you might pass something on. I’d never forgive myself. And that goes for everybody. And ’cause the thing is I like to go to concerts and stuff like that as well, and me being of an age, I suppose that it kind of makes sense now.’

Referencing the overwhelmingly positive response to KK’S PRIEST, Downing added: “I’m loving all of this, obviously. It’s new lease on life. And there’s a long way to go yet. And I wanna make sure I’m gonna be here to deliver it up.”

Downing is joined in KK’S PRIEST by former JUDAS PRIEST singer Tim “Ripper” Owens (vocals), along with guitarist A.J. Mills (HOSTILE), bassist Tony Newton (VOODOO SIX) and drummer Sean Elg (DEATHRIDERS, CAGE).

KK’S PRIEST’s “Sermons Of The Sinner” LP was released on October 1 via Explorer1 Music Group/EX1 Records.

Downing spent four months writing and recording “Sermons Of The Sinner” and, along with new ideas, he even resurrected a few archived riffs from the ’80s.

K.K. formed KK’S PRIEST after JUDAS PRIEST turned down his offer to rejoin the band for their 50th-anniversary tour. It followed a couple of celebrated stage appearances, first with former MANOWAR guitarist Ross The Boss in the summer of 2019, then with a one-off lineup that included former MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson and former PRIEST drummer Les Binks later that year.

Downing left PRIEST in 2011 amid claims of band conflict, shoddy management and declining quality of performance. He was replaced by Richie Faulkner, nearly three decades his junior.

In 2019, Downing said that he reached out to JUDAS PRIEST about taking part in the band’s upcoming 50th-anniversary tour but that their response was that they were not interested in including him in the celebrations.

In 2018, Downing revealed that he sent two resignation letters to his bandmates when he decided to quit JUDAS PRIEST. The first was described as “a graceful exit note, implying a smooth retirement from music,” while the second was “angrier, laying out all of his frustrations with specific parties.”

Downing later said that he believed the second letter was “a key reason” he wasn’t invited to rejoin PRIEST after Glenn Tipton’s decision to retire from touring.